Most of our actors these days have been there a few years so we have a good core that being said out the new ones we get we usually lose about 30 percent of them by the end of the season. So many people do not realize just how much work and time it is to be a haunt actor. That being said I have noticed the drop rate also depends on the age. Once you hit actors whom are 24 and above they tend to be more stable and stick around more. It is usually the teens and young adults whom did not realize they just gave up every weekend in October nearly.

As far as actor drop rate(in my personal opinion), it depends on many diffrent factors.

Actor and owners attitude. Attiudes spread LIKE WILD FIRE. When we do our haunt me and my freind tell out actors "leave your attitudes at the door no BS !!!!!!!" We treat our actors the way we want to be treated. There is NO ROOM for attitudes in what we are doing. Since the time frames for planning and building and acting in a haunt is so short(yes some haunts , including ourselves, start planning almost immediately after the fog has settled on the last night) we dont have the time to deal with other peoples "tudes".

Actor appreciation. Lets face it unless you have ALOT of HIGH END animatronics, actors in a Haunt are the BEST assest we can have. ALWAYS appreciate your acotrs, compliment them when they do a good job, correct them when they do something wrong(constructively) show then what they did wrong and how to do it right.

Actor Creativity. Let your actors be creative. Give them a good idea of what you want from them in thier area , and let them run with it, again correct (constructively) when needed.

Paid vs. un-paid. This is a tough one. Some actors will JUST LOVE the fact that they get to have fun scaring the s#!t outta peoeple and that is payment enough for them. Others its a "meh" thing. Choose your actors wisely. If youare looking to have all voulenteer.. DEFINATELY try to pick the right people. Sure you could get the high school kids and they woudl just be there to get some voulteer credits for school. Or Scouts that need to do it go achive a certain rank. Those can be you best bet. Who knows maybe they will be back maybe they wont. but if you get the right group, your all get and not have to spend a dime.

Currently we have our "core group" of about 13 people we have known each other for anywhere from 12 years to 3 years. So far we have only lost 4(but they got replaced) more so due to moving out of the area ans personal life issues. And they have been replaced. so we still have 13 people.

We get the "random person" that wants to help out but passes by the way side. When we are FULL STAFFED we have close to 20 people.

We have set rules for EVERYONE , we do meetings through the year and have pizza parties, and what have you . Just so we can keep in touch with everyone and make sure they they are still dedicated to doing the haunt.

Basically in summary, its all in how you treat your actors. if you treat them like s#!t they WON'T want to come back. If you trat them like "family" they will want to stay and will follow you from place to place if you need them to.

Mind you, ALL OUR ACTORS are voulnteer. And range in age from 14/15 upwards to in the late 50's
Just my "long winded" toughts.
~LoneWolf